Budget 2020: Government will raise living wage and lift floor for National Insurance
The chancellor Rishi Sunak said today that the government will raise the national living wage to £10.50 by 2024 and will raise the minimum threshold for National Insurance.
In his budget speech Sunak announced a goal of raising the national living wage to two thirds of median earnings by 2024 – which would be equivalent to £10.50 an hour.
The wage is going up next month to £8.72 per hour which the government said means it is on track to hit its current target of 60 per cent of median earnings by this year.
The living wage will apply to workers aged 23 and over in April 2021, with a target for it to apply to workers aged 21 and over by 2024, the government said.
It currently only applies to workers aged 25 and over.
The chancellor also said the National Insurance threshold will be increased from £8,632 to £9,500 next month.
“That’s a tax cut for 31m people, saving a typical employee £104,” he said.
The government said the increase was a first step in meeting its ambition to increase the threshold to £12,500.
Sunak said the Conservatives are “the real worker’s party”.
The Labour Party tweeted that the increases were “another Tory con trick”.
“Their increase won’t apply to everyone and people will have to wait years for it. Labour’s promise was for an immediate £10 minimum for everyone over 16,” Labour’s press account tweeted.
Martin Jones, partner at accountancy firm UHY Hacker Young, said: “Increasing the already aggressive targets for the national living wage will add to the cost burden on restaurants and pubs that are already struggling to make ends meet.”
“Wages are often the largest overhead restaurants and pubs face and this measure increases that overhead even further.”
“In some cases, this rise in costs could push businesses towards insolvency.”